2011 Pinot Days: 183 Wines from 65 Producers
Fort Mason Festival Pavillon, San Francisco, California
Tasted Saturday, June 18, 2011 by rjonwine@gmail.com with 2,335 views
Introduction
photo by Sandy Crozier
I always look forward to Pinot Days, as Steve and Lisa Rigisich do such a great job of corralling a host of great California and Oregon producers, and a few stray French ones, for a very well organized and comprehensive event. There are so many strong California producers available that one can get a pretty good sense of what the current vintage is like up and down the state.
In a shift from the past several years, the grand tasting this year was held on a Saturday instead of a Sunday, and a week earlier than in the past. The Saturday seminars were therefore eliminated, but there were a couple of seminars offered on Friday afternoon and evening (Williams Selyem and Oregon Pinots) which I did not attend, and a seminar Saturday evening (originally featuring a dozen, and ultimately 14, “Noble Stars” celebrating “Pinot’s diversity”), which I did attend. My notes are therefore based on the Saturday grand tasting and the evening seminar, between which I managed to taste 183 wines from 65 producers. Of these, the 2009 vintage dominated with 87 samples, 55 were 2008s, 29 were from 2007, seven (mainly rosés and barrel samples) were 2010 babies, and five more hailed from older vintages. Four were rosés, five were whites and the rest–174–were reds. Most were, appropriately, Pinot Noirs–a total of 174–with the rest being Chardonnay (3), Pinot Gris (2), Syrah or Syrah blend (2), rosé blend (1) or Pinotage (1).
In terms of vintage, 2007s continue to be impressive, structured and made for aging. The 2008 vintage was a very challenging one, both due to weather conditions and fires that raged up and down the state, leading to noticeable smoke damage on Pinot and other red varieties. It was California’s weakest vintage by far in many years, and I consider it a near miracle that some producers were able to pull out a good Pinot in such a difficult vintage. A number of these near miracles were featured at this tasting, as well as some that reminded me of all the 2008 “ashtray” wines I’ve had to taste to date as a result of this smoke-plagued vintage. So far, 2009s are showing expressive fruit and balance, with many producers having dialed back on the ripeness levels of two and three years ago. The regrettable trend that I wrote about last year, and that I’m continuing to see too many examples of, is high stem or whole cluster inclusion levels. I’ve written here a number of times about my concern that Pinot Noir’s delicate fruit is easily overwhelmed by a high percentage of stems, or whole cluster inclusion. Unlike Syrah, which can really stand up to, and benefit from, high percentages of stem inclusion, Pinot with high stem inclusion turns into “vin de stem”–a stemmy wine, with a lot of green notes, and barely discernable fruit. At best, I get green peppercorn on some of these wines, but very little of the silky red fruit and cherry, with good acid levels and overall balance, that makes Pinot Noir my favorite red grape. Pinot with fairly low stem inclusion–at most, 10 to 15%–can often lead to good texture and complexity of flavors with a few years of age. In my fervent opinion, however, based on lots of tastings, it is the extremely rare Pinot Noir that merits or benefits from inclusion of more than 15% whole cluster. I won’t bother to list the producers whose wines veered into the vin de stem territory here, but you can easily pick them out from my tasting notes below.
There were over 200 producers on hand, so in deciding which wineries to taste in the several hours I had, I ruled out several great Pinot producers that I had tasted recently: August West, Big Basin, Cargasacchi, Etude, Siduri (except for the one I tasted at the evening seminar, as I usually get to taste most of the lineup every year with Adam), and Sojourn. I also try to get to as many new producers, or at least new-to-me producers as I can.
This year, my favorite producers outside of those above, whose wines I rated an average of 91 points or more, were Arcadian, Archery Summit, Baxter, Benovia, Clos Pepe, Copain, Dutton-Goldfield, Fort Ross, Gypsy Canyon, Hirsch, Kosta Browne, Ladd Cellars, Loring, Mahoney, Roar, Romililly, Scherrer, Small Vines and Zotovich. My favorite Pinots of the tasting, which I rated 91+ points or higher, were:
2007 Arcadian Pisoni – 91+ points
2005 Arcadian Fiddlestix – 91+ points
2009 Archery Summit Arcus Estate – 93 points
2008 Archery Summit Arcus Estate – 92 points
2007 Baxter Toulouse Vineyard – 91+ points
2007 Baxter Oppenlander Vineyard – 92 points
2009 Benovia Sonoma Coast – 91+ points
2009 Benovia Savoy Vineyard – 92 points
2009 Benovia La Pommeraie – 93 points
2009 Clos Pepe Vigneron Select – 93 points
2009 Copain Wentzel Vineyard – 92+ points
2009 Copain Les Voisins – 91+ points
2009 Dutton-Goldfield Fox Den – 92 points
2009 Failla Hirsch Vineyard 92+ points
2009 Failla Occidental Ridge – 92+ points
2007 Fort Ross Symposium – 92+ points
2009 Fort Ross Sea Slopes – 92 points
2007 Fort Ross Reserve Fort Ross Vineyard – 93+ points
2009 Hirsch San Andreas Fault – 91+ points
2009 Kosta Browne Sonoma Coast – 91+ points
2009 Kosta Browne Russian River Valley – 92+ points
2009 Kosta Browne Gap’s Crown Vineyard – 92 points
2008 Ladd Cellars Russian River Valley – 91+ points
2008 Ladd Cellars Cuvee Abigail – 92 points
2008 Ladd Cellars Moore Ranch Vineyard – 92 points
2007 Le Cadeau Diversite – 91+ points
2007 Londer Paraboll – 91+ points
2007 Londer Estate Grown – 91+ points
2007 Mahoney Las Brisas Vineyard – 91+ points
2007 Mahoney Mahoney Ranch – 92 points
2009 Roar Rosella’s Vineyard – 92 points
2009 Roar Pisoni Vineyard – 92+ points
2008 Scherrer Sonoma County – 92 points
2007 Scherrer Russian River Valley – 92 points
2008 Scherrer Russian River Valley – 91+ points
2007 Scherrer “Big Brother” – 92 points
2008 Scherrer Platt Vineyard – 92+ points
2009 Small Vines – 91+ points
2009 Small Vines MK Vineyard – 92+ points
2009 Small Vines Baranoff Vineyard – 92 points
I have just a few more brief notes about some standouts from the tasting before getting to my detailed tasting notes below. It’s true what you’ve heard about Kosta Browne–the 2009s are more balanced than these wines have ever been before, and I was quite impressed by them. Their fruit sources have always been top notch, and by getting with the modern trend of picking for balance, rather than maximum sugar levels, they’ve created some beautiful wines that also have some good aging potential. Archery Summit was my favorite of the Oregon producers, and it’s nice to see their wines showing strongly again. A relatively new producer, Baxter, continues to impress. The 2009s from Benovia were the best overall I’ve tasted from them so far–they’re clearly going from strength to strength, and make excellent Chardonnays too. I didn’t get a chance to taste the whole Clos Pepe lineup this time, unfortunately, but the 2009 Vigneron Select was definitely one of my wines of the day. Well done! The Failla lineup was really good overall, except for a very bretty Sonoma Coast bottling. Fort Ross continues to be a great source of ageworthy wines, and the ’07 Reserve was another WOTD. The Ladd Cellars 2008s were among those miraculous 2008s I’m talking about. I don’t know how Eric did it in such a challenging year, but all four were very good Pinots. Mahoney continues to be a great source of undervalued and under-the-radar Pinots. The combination of Ed Kurtzman’s winemaking and Gary Franscioni’s great fruit leads to continuing pleasures from Roar. Fred Scherrer is one of California’s great underappreciated winemakers, and his recent Pinots are as strong as everything else he does. Paul Sloan’s Small Vines 2009s are continuing his winning streak, and showing what his young but maturing vineyards are capable of. And, finally, the French offerings the last couple of years have been minimal and weak. Does it make sense to keep offering a few Burgundies at these events? Shouldn’t the focus be on what Pinot Days showcases so well: West Coast Pinot Noir?
Flight 1 - Adastra (2 Notes)
Flight 2 - Aeshna (5 Notes)
Flight 3 - Alma Rosa (2 Notes)
Flight 4 - Ancient Oak (1 Note)
Flight 5 - Arcadian (4 Notes)
Flight 6 - Archery Summit (3 Notes)
Flight 7 - Baxter (2 Notes)
Flight 8 - Benovia (3 Notes)
Flight 9 - Carabella (3 Notes)
Flight 10 - Clos Pepe (1 Note)
Flight 11 - Copain (2 Notes)
Flight 12 - Couloir (1 Note)
Flight 13 - Dutton-Goldfield (1 Note)
Flight 14 - Eric Kent (4 Notes)
Flight 15 - Failla (4 Notes)
Flight 16 - Fog Crest (2 Notes)
Flight 17 - Fort Ross (5 Notes)
photo by Sandy Crozier
Flight 18 - Foursight (2 Notes)
Flight 19 - Foxen (2 Notes)
Flight 20 - Freeman (4 Notes)
Flight 21 - Frogmore Creek (2 Notes)
Flight 22 - Furthermore (3 Notes)
Flight 23 - Gary Farrell (2 Notes)
Flight 24 - Gypsy Canyon (1 Note)
Flight 25 - Hilliard Bruce (3 Notes)
Flight 26 - Hirsch (3 Notes)
Flight 27 - J.K. Carriere (3 Notes)
Flight 28 - Joseph Jewell (4 Notes)
Flight 29 - Joseph Swan (5 Notes)
Flight 30 - Kanzler (1 Note)
Flight 31 - Keefer Ranch (2 Notes)
Flight 32 - Kosta Browne (4 Notes)
Flight 33 - Ladd Cellars (4 Notes)
Flight 34 - Lattanzio (2 Notes)
Flight 35 - Le Cadeau (6 Notes)
Flight 36 - Londer (4 Notes)
Flight 37 - Loring (1 Note)
Flight 39 - Mahoney (5 Notes)
Flight 40 - Martinelli (3 Notes)
Flight 41 - Masút (1 Note)
Flight 42 - Morgan (6 Notes)
Flight 43 - native9 (2 Notes)
Flight 44 - Pelerin (3 Notes)
Flight 45 - Perception (2 Notes)
Flight 46 - Raptor Ridge (2 Notes)
Flight 47 - Riverbench (3 Notes)
Flight 48 - Roar (2 Notes)
Flight 49 - Romililly (1 Note)
Flight 50 - Sandole (1 Note)
Flight 51 - Sarapo (2 Notes)
Flight 52 - Scherrer (6 Notes)
Flight 53 - Sequana (2 Notes)
Flight 54 - Domaine Serene (2 Notes)
Flight 55 - Siduri (1 Note)
Flight 56 - Small Vines (3 Notes)
Flight 57 - Stomping Girl (3 Notes)
Flight 58 - Straight Line (1 Note)
Flight 59 - Suacci Carciere (4 Notes)
Flight 60 - Talisman (4 Notes)
Flight 61 - Domaine de la Vougeraie (3 Notes)
Flight 62 - White Rose (3 Notes)
Flight 63 - Willamette Valley (4 Notes)
Flight 64 - Wind Gap (1 Note)
Flight 65 - Windy Oaks (3 Notes)
Flight 66 - Zotovich (3 Notes)
2008 Adastra Pinot Noir 86 Points
USA, California, Napa / Sonoma, Carneros
Black fruit, tart black fruit nose; tart black fruit, plum palate; medium finish
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2007 Adastra Pinot Noir Proximus 90 Points
USA, California, Napa / Sonoma, Carneros
Berry, black fruit nose; berry, blackberry palate; medium-plus finish (80% new oak; Pommard, 777 and 115)
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